'Nexit': Dutch right-wing politician Geert Wilders is campaigning for the Netherlands to leave the EU and the monetary union

The Netherlands would be better off if it left the EU and the single currency, a new study claims.

The figures have been put forward by Geert Wilders, the leader of the Dutch far-right Freedom Party as part of his campaign 'Nexit' ahead of the European parliamentary elections in May.

The study claims each Dutch household would benefit by nearly £8,000 a year and national income will grow by over £1 trillion if Wilders's ‘Nexit’ – a play on the Netherlands and the word ‘exit’ - becomes reality.

The Dutch government rejects Wilders' views, saying a pullout from the European Union would cause irreparable damage to trade relations in a country heavily reliant on trade, and a euro departure would lead to a new financial crisis.

‘I cannot explain to any voters in the Netherlands that we have to raise taxes, cut health care for the elderly, for example, but that we send billions of euros to the Southern European countries (for bailouts), or all the fees we pay to Brussels,’ Wilders said at a press conference outside Dutch parliament.

At the press conference, Wilders presented a study that concluded there would be significant positive economic effects from leaving the EU. He commissioned the study from the London-based think-tank Capital Economics, founded by the Euroskeptic economist Roger Bootle.

The study concluded that Dutch national income could increase by as much as £1.3 trillion (€1,500 billion) by 2035, bringing new wealth equivalent to between £8,134 per household each year.

On a per-capita basis, the Dutch are among the highest net contributors to the EU.

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‘We think the Swiss option is viable for the Netherlands,’ Pragnell said, referring to Switzerland's good bilateral relations and trade with the European Union, even as it conducts its own monetary policy.

It is not clear that the Netherlands would be able to negotiate the same deals Switzerland has. Many would find it difficult to imagine the European Union without the Netherlands, one of its founding members and traditionally a strong supporter of the union.

The study by London-based think-tank Capital Economics, claims each Dutch household would benefit by nearly £8,000 a year and national income will grow by over £1 trillion

But Wilders called the report's result ‘the best news for the Netherlands in years.’

‘It offers the Netherlands a way out of this crisis,’ he said.

The report was met with scepticism, with the country’s finance minister and chairman of eurozone meetings, Jeroen Dijsselbloem, saying he would read the report but that leaving the EU and the euro would be ‘very unwise.

‘Netherlands is an economic powerhouse in Europe. We earn the bulk of our wealth in trade with EU countries so Netherlands has lots of interest in an internal market with easy trade,’ he said told the Telegraph.

‘There is also the single currency. This is very strong at present and the state of the eurozone looks a lot better than a few years ago. There is no reason to take us into new adventures. I would be very against.’

Dutch GDP has scarcely grown since the start of the 2008 financial crisis, due in part to a sharp fall in housing prices, though most economists forecast a modest return to growth in 2014.

Unemployment is around 7 per cent and rising, and many Dutch are unhappy with the government's austerity policies, after years of painful spending cuts and tax hikes.